Canadian Journal of Buddhist Studies (CJBS)
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Book Reviews
No full textBuddhism, Economics and Science: Further Studies in Socially Engaged Humanistic Buddhism by Dr. Ananda W. P. Guruge (Authorhouse: 2008). Paperback; 208 pages.Wild Geese: Buddhism in Canada. Eds. John S. Harding, Victor Sogen Hori, and Alexander Soucy Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press, 2010
Entrepreneurial Action: Enacting Buddhist Economics in the Small
No full textThis paper examines how Buddhist thought can be manifested in the entrepreneurial economic sphere, and particularly in the decision to exploit new business opportunities. It uses elements of diverse social theory to examine how entrepreneurs integrate their individualist roles as innovators and creators within preexisting social systems and structures, to enact a conception of entrepreneurship within the Buddhist doctrine of Right Livelihood. Empirical qualitative evidence from Buddhist entrepreneurs in Canada and Nepal is provided to support an interpretation in which conceptions of Right Livelihood play an important role in the evaluation and exploitation of entrepreneurial opportunities and in the day-to-day operations of the resultant new businesses
Sakyadhita: Buddhist Women in a Transnational Forum
No full textSakyadhita, “Daughters of the Buddha,” is a transnational organization that attempts to link Buddhist women together. Its mission statement outlines objectives that include working toward full ordination of women in all Buddhist traditions and providing resources for women to be more active participants and teachers within Buddhist traditions. Built into Sakyadhita’s goals are numerous challenges: the difficulties of sustaining a global project, of acquiring the means and committed personnel to do so, and the strain of its activist platform. A further challenge is the organization’s capacity to bridge difference reflected in different understandings of Buddhist history and practices, different views of women’s development, differing feminisms, and contentions over the use of resources, financial and otherwise. To take a closer look at Sakyadhita’s work and its ability to meet its objectives, the researchers undertook a case study of the Sixth Sakyadhita Conference, held in Lumbini, Nepal in 2000. Through a survey of the conference participants (including some follow-up interviews) the researchers were able to establish a profile of the workings of the organization
The Homology of Emotionality and Rationality (Part 2)
No full textThe dichotomy between emotion and reason has been a feature of western thought extending back to Plato in the 3rd century BCE. From the Buddhist point of view, however, both emotionality and rationality are seen as obscurations of the individual’s original luminous being. Rationality obscures the lumen naturale by differentiating original experience into subject and object, understood both egologically and egocentrically. Emotionality obscures the lumen naturale by responding to rationality’s depiction of reality positively or negatively, by embracing or resisting it, and by attempting to abet or curtail it. Both rationality and emotionality are biological phenomena: rationality is an intellectual obscuration and emotionality a kind of instinctual obscuration. Both together poison the atmosphere for human experiencing.Tibetan rdzogs-chen ‘ultimate completeness’ thinking starts from the idea of Being, which—as Martin Heidegger has shown—is not a thing or being, and thus not quantifiable. It views all objects of experience from the vantage point of the integral unity of wholeness that, in its lighting-up, unfolds its inner dynamic spontaneously as a holo-movement, displaying itself andenhancing its performance and beauty. Basing himself on thesources pertaining to the emergence of rdzogs-chen thought, and elaborating the ideas of Padmasambhava, Vimalamitra andArisingha (the Daoist Hva-shang Mahayana), the scholar-poet kLong-chen rab-byams-pa (1308-64) has given a most lucid interpretation of the homology of rationality and emotionality.* Part I appeared in CJBS Number One (2005)
No-Mind and Nothingness: From Zen Buddhism to Heidegger
No full textIn China there was a distinction between Zen Buddhism of the Tang Dynasty and that of the Sung Dynasty. In the Zen Buddhism of the Tang Dynasty the doctrine of wu-hsin (No-mind) played a key role; while in that of the Sung Dynasty the notion of wu (Nothingness) itself became the focus. In the former, wu primarily represented a functional principle, whereas in the latter, it became an ontological principle. Historically, the doctrine of No-mind was introduced by Hui-neng, the founder of the Southern School of Zen Buddhism. Later in the Lin-chi School, this doctrine was concretized into the concept of wu-wei jan-jen. In modern scholarship, both the concepts of No-mind and of wu-wei jan-jen, however, remain unclear. As a result, the Japanese Critical Buddhism even claims that Zen is not Buddhist. This paper will show in what way Heideggerian phenomenology can contribute to the articulation of a particular type of religious experience, namely, the Zen experience. As wil be seen, with the help of Heidegger’s doctrine of Dasein as the “place-holder of Nothingness,” it is possible to achieve a proper understanding of these major concepts in Zen Buddhism. Moreover, in terms of the turn (Kehre) in Heidegger’s way of thinking, one can understand why there was a transition from “No-mind” to “Nothingness” in the development of Zen Buddhism. Finally, one can trace the origin of the Kyoto School’s notion of “locus” (basho) in the concept of wu-wei jan-jen